Tex Murphy: Martian Memorandum – A Fair & Balanced Retrospective

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Features by Adventure Game Hotspot staff
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After tackling the virtually unknown (which, frankly, perhaps even the developers would prefer) first game in the Tex Murphy series – no, not Under a Killing Moon, but Mean Streets, the real first game – the Space Quest Historian is back to continue his dalliance with his second favourite franchise with a deep dive retrospective of the next game – no, STILL not Under a Killing Moon, but rather the only-slightly-less-unknown Martian Memorandum.

In this game, Tex is hired to find the abducted daughter of a wealthy business tycoon who owns most of the colony on Mars, as well as an ancient artifact of mystical powers that was stolen from him. Possibly in that order. Or not. Naturally, things aren't quite so straightforward in a story that is as implausible as it is engrossing, ultimately sending Tex to the Red Planet itself.

The good news is, the sequel is a major improvement over its predecessor from a writing, style and FMV presentation perspective. The bad news is, that was a low bar to clear and it's still not all that good.

Gone are the shooting segments and dreadful flight sim sequences this time around, replaced here by equally awful but thankfully shorter action sequences and a much greater focus on exploration and interrogation. Ditched, too, are the text parser and nested hotspot menus in favour of a verb-based point-and-click control scheme, with all the pixel hunting that comes with it, as well as some choice-based dialogue trees that involve getting lucky, in more ways than one.

It's very much a mixed bag, then, with plenty to criticize, and you can be sure SQH doesn't hold back. For the most part, however, it's a major step towards the brilliance of the next game still to come – yes, that'd be Under a Killing Moon.

If that's whet your appetite for more, you can watch the Space Quest Historian play Martian Memorandum in its entirety on his alternate YouTube channel.

The Space Quest Historian is part of the Adventure Game Hotspot Network, a collective of talented, dedicated content producers who work entirely independently but have joined forces to promote each other’s efforts. All opinions expressed belong solely to the original creators.